


Eye of the Storm

by verbaepulchellae



Category: The 100 (TV)
Genre: Angst, Canon, Drabble, Gen, Post 410, Spoilers, nondirect love confessions, the Blake siblings
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-05-09
Updated: 2017-05-09
Packaged: 2018-10-30 00:59:06
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,228
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10865748
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/verbaepulchellae/pseuds/verbaepulchellae
Summary: “Can I have a word?”Octavia’s eyes flicker, she knows why he’s here, has probably expected him since Clarke and Jaha were taken to the bottom level and cold, concrete cells. “You’re my brother, of course.”





	Eye of the Storm

**Author's Note:**

> This drabble inspired from conversations with people my gc (shout out, y'all are cuties) and by @velvet-tread's wonderful meta about Octavia (and Jasper) where can be read [here!](http://velvet-tread.tumblr.com/post/160478077528/octavia-jasper-and-leadership-on-the-100) , as well as Marie's interview about the upcoming episode. 
> 
> Comments and kudos are always appreciated!

Octavia sits in the chair behind the desk, Indra and Kane flanking her, other clans’ chiefs and surviving warriors of rank filling out the space around her, Gaia quiet and composed in the midst of it. O looks beautiful, even bloody and dirty and exhausted after the conclave, she’s every bit the warrior queen that their mother read them stories about, that he and O played at her being when they were little. This power, this acceptance and acknowledgement is everything he’s ever wanted for her: after sixteen years under the floor, the world finally sees Octavia for who she is.

“Can I have a word?”

Octavia’s eyes flicker, she knows why he’s here, has probably expected him since Clarke and Jaha were taken to the bottom level and cold, concrete cells. “You’re my brother, of course.”

He still can’t quite believe it, that she’s alive, that she’d thrown herself into his arms when the bunker door had opened. _I knew it,_ she’d whispered into his shoulder, clinging to him with an intensity he hasn’t felt since the guards dragged her away from him on the Ark. _I knew you’d come for me._

“Can we talk alone?” For a moment he doesn’t think she’ll agree but then she looks up at Kane and he nods.

There’s a little bit of low murmuring, but Octavia has secured her place among them by guaranteeing their survival. A moment alone with her brother is little to ask.

When the room is empty, she gets up from the chair, clearly not yet comfortable in filling the space and prestige of a leader when he’s standing in front of her. She walks around the desk and leans on it instead. “What’s up?”

“We need to talk about Clarke.”

Octavia’s face closes, swift and fierce and suddenly impassive. “She stole the bunker, Bellamy. She and Jaha locked me out to die, locked out everyone except for Skaikru. I can’t let that go without an answer, not if we expect to be trapped down here in peace for the next five years.”

“So what, you keep her imprisoned?”

Octavia looks down and Bellamy goes cold.

“O, please.”

“Clarke allowed a bomb to drop on three hundred people at TonDC, including me. She just made a decision to let seven hundred people die in order to save less than five hundred. Blood must have Blood, and it’s overdue.”

“She did what she thought she had to do.” _Like Always_ , Clarke whispers in his head, with a gun trembling between them _._ “Like she’s always done, O,” he says it gently but she still flinches. “You already managed to bend the rules to help the others survive. You can bend these too.”

“Bellamy, she’s still Wanheda to them. She tried to trick them into making her the commander.”

“To save _them._ ”

“They don’t care.” Octavia says a little helplessly. “Bellamy, what am I supposed to do?”

He hears the desperation in it, hears her uncertainty even as she tries to stand up for what they both know is the only viable option if they’re going to have peace. Bellamy can’t take it though, can’t stand the memory of Clarke, hollowed eyed and quiet when she’d been locked up, her fight gone, head bowed, not looking at him. If she’s executed, he can’t have that be his last memory of her, can’t bear to see her killed either.

“Pardon her. Please. You have that power.”

“You know I can’t do that, Bell.”

“I tried-” he says and hates himself, but it’s his last hope. “O, I tried to save Lincoln. And I know that you had no reason to trust me. I know I wouldn’t have trusted me either, but please. Please-” he’s losing his coherency, reaching the point where the reality that this is when he loses Clarke is beginning to settle in like a dead weight in his stomach, dragging him down into darkness. He takes a breath.

“I never wanted Lincoln to die. I never wanted you to have to lose him. And I’m begging you, O-,” his voice cracks and Octavia looks up at him, her eyes glassy with unshed tears. “I’m not as strong as you are. I can’t lose her. Don’t make me have to go through what you went through with Lincoln.”

“I can’t let her stay here,” Octavia whispers. “Even imprisoned she takes a spot away from someone else.”

Bellamy hears her implication without Octavia saying it, knows she’s resisting because banishing Clarke is almost as good as a death sentence for two. Almost, but not quite.

“There’s a place we could go,” Bellamy says. “Murphy says there’s another bunker on the island.”

“Bellamy,” Octavia says, voice bitten off, harsh and angry and scared. “You wouldn’t have to go.”

Bellamy shakes his head, scuffs his toe on the floor because this is hard, it’s so damn hard and unfair. But if Clarke goes, he can’t stay. Even if she had a good chance of making it, he can’t relive those three months where she disappeared into the wilderness and he didn’t know if she was surviving or dying slowly of starvation or exposure. He can’t go back there, not for five years, and he knows O knows that too.

“You don’t have the rover… directions….” Octavia’s voice is shaking but she’s trying to force down the emotion. “What about food? Supplies?”

“We’ll figure something out.”

“That’s not good enough,” Octavia snaps. “Bellamy, Clarke made her choices. You let us back in, you opened the door. You don’t have to follow her out there to die.”

“Yes I do, O. I won’t let her go alone.”

“Because you love her?” Octavia spits. “I could keep you from leaving.”

Bellamy just looks at her and Octavia can’t stare him down. They both know if not for Kane, she would have thrown herself down in the mud next to Lincoln and died at Pike’s hand too. “Bell, please,” she whispers. “I just got you back.”

“You aren’t losing me, O. Never.” His voice is gruff and he has to clear his throat. “Come here.”

She shakes her head, staring at the floor, shoulders trembling a little, so Bellamy goes to her. She lets him pull her close and fit his hand over the nape of her neck, try to offer her what comfort he can give her in the face of this impossible decision.

“I’m so proud of you,” he tells her and she bites back a sob, clings to his jacket like she’s still a little girl, waking herself up with clenched teeth from nightmares. The girl under the floor, the leader of a new, singular clan. “I’ll see you again,” he promises. “This isn’t goodbye forever.”

“You’re damn right it’s not,” she parrots back to him and then gives him a gentle push back. He lets her go and she takes a shuddering breath and stands tall. “You’ll have more time if you go now.” she says it with finality and Bellamy nods, neither of them is good at goodbyes.

He’s halfway out the door when she says, “Be safe, big brother.”

He looks back at her in the flickering electric light, and she’s at once as familiar and as she is strange and new. He nods, fights down all the things they still haven’t said to each other. “You too, O.”

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for the read!


End file.
